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The NSF-funded “Tough as Nails, Nimble Fingers: Developing a K-8 Coding Pathway for Kentucky Appalachia” project, might have been an education initiative where “experts” flew in from cities, taught the latest trends in science, technology, engineering, art and mathematics (STEAM) education, and called it a success. It also could have been a project that dissipated under the pressures and limitations of the COVID-19 pandemic. Instead, our K-8 computational thinking (CT) and STEAM education initiative in Kentucky Appalachia, which began in fall 2019, has turned into a vehicle of community collaboration and healing, owned and co-operated by community members. This paper focuses on how the teacher training evolved over time to promote narrative development and healing. The economic hardship and correlative social fracturing, from which Eastern Kentucky wishes to heal, is not obvious from a casual visit to their beautiful mountain community. We rarely speak about it in project-related meetings, even four years into a trusted partnership. Illustratively articulated in Appalachian Ingenuity (Bit Source, 2018) and elsewhere (Keefe, 2005), the struggle is of a longstanding nature, largely stemming from the collapse of the coal mining industry, associated with losses of well-paying jobs, friends and family leaving the area in droves, and mental health issues related to perceived hopelessness and loss of dignity. This is atop at least six decades of struggle to combat negative stereotypes about the region, perpetuated by politicians and media (Bowler 1985; Newman, 2019). Our very first summer teacher training (2020) was focused on teaching introductory CT and broader STEAM lessons, and garnering teacher buy-in and enthusiasm, especially with a pivot to an online format due to the pandemic. The positive participant evaluations gave us confidence that the teachers would benefit from knowing how their CT lessons can contribute beyond their classroom, to the healing and empowerment of the greater community. Therefore, for summer 2021, we dedicated a day for reflection and celebration (“Inspire Friday”), and included a panel discussion by local workforce representatives to convey three important points: (1) there is a lot of ingenuity among Appalachian people (and CT overlaps with this), (2) it is important to share stories of success and hope, (3) educators play an essential role in community revitalization. The appreciation that the teachers expressed about this workforce panel was very positive (e.g., “I truly loved this portion of this week. It allowed us to evaluate how education is an important piece of the larger work that is going on in our region.”) that it emboldened us to further revise the training for 2022. We had daily “Inspire talks” representing multiple local industries (e.g., telecommunications, music), that exemplified Appalachian ingenuity and emphasized the importance of CT competencies. We also added leadership training (e.g., storytelling and “what is CT?”) that provided frameworks for educators to become agents of change beyond their classroom. We also arranged a field trip to a local software development company, where teachers interacted with staff (former coal miners) about skills they look for in employees. The evaluations and subsequent conversations with educators strongly suggested that the workshop contributed to healing, hope and a new culturally responsive vision for CT education in Appalachia. 

When designing learning environments and curricula for diverse populations, it is beneficial to connect with learners’ cultural knowledge, and the related interests, they bring to the learning context. To aid in the design and development of a computing curriculum and identify these areas of personal and cultural connection, we conducted a series of participatory design sessions. The goal of these sessions was to col- lect ideas around ways to make the instructional materials reflect the interests and voices of the learners. In this paper, we examine how the use of participatory design techniques can advance our understanding of the domains influencing today’s youth. Specifically, we examine the ideas generated by youth during these sessions as a means to understand what influences them and their ideas of cultural relevancy. In this work, we identify the resources children draw on across design activities and organize them to extend the Spheres of Influence framework (L. Archer et al., 2014). We identify seven spheres to attend to when designing for learning: Home and Family, School and Work, Hobbies and Leisure, Media, Interests, Peers, and Identity. 

Over the last three years, we have worked in a research practice partnership (RPP) between a research non-profit and three school districts to establish system-wide K-12 pathways that support equitable participation in computational thinking (CT) that is consistent across classrooms, cumulative from year to year, and competency-based. Reflecting on the work done over the last three years, we have identified tensions related to ambition and specificity within our RPP and the development, implementation, and spread of inclusive computing pathways. Ambitions can waver between grandiose upheaval in curriculum and classes and the identification of CT solely in what is already happening. While it is relatively easy to adopt and spread programs that propose modest change, these programs are not necessarily worth an investment nor do they produce CT skills in alignment with the district's overall vision. Similarly, the specificity in which computational thinking is operationalized can teeter between prescriptive lesson plans and broadly-stated curricular standards. Vague initiatives are difficult to implement, but teachers are also resistant to overly prescriptive programs. In this paper, we explore these tensions balancing ambition and specificity using examples from our partner districts. Drawing on our experiences co-designing the inclusive computing pathways as well as interviews with and open-ended questionnaire responses from our district partners, we discuss implications related to these issues and the ongoing tensions around ambition and specificity that need to be considered and overcome in terms of meeting the national call to develop more inclusive computing pathways for schools and districts. 

The design of most learning environments focuses on supporting students in making, constructing, and putting together projects on and off the screen, with much less attention paid to the many issues—problems, bugs, or traps—that students invariably encounter along the way. In this symposium, we present different theoretical and disciplinary perspectives on understanding how learners engage in debugging applications on and off screen, examine learners’ mindsets about debugging from middle school to college students and teachers, and present pedagogical approaches that promote strategies for debugging problems, even having learners themselves design problems for others. We contend that learning to identify and fix problems—debug, troubleshoot, or get unstuck—in completing projects provides a productive space in which to explore multiple theoretical perspectives that can contribute to our understanding of learning and teaching critical strategies for dealing with challenges in learning activities and environments.